integral praxis: Intersubjectivity and Interobjectivity in the Kosmos
One of the nagging problems I've had with Wilber's Integral development model is the presumption that those of "lesser" development might one day claw their way up into the "elite" realms of Integral consciousness, if only they.... what? meditate more? buy more of Wilber's books? It's never terribly clear.
It seems to me there have been "radically inclusive" thinkers throughout history, as well as less inclusive masses (who aren't always terribly receptive to the thinkers' notions). There have been some changes in the "midpoint" of that mass, but that sort of change has always been very slow, with a long, thick trail (tail?), and tied to generational cycles much like paradigm shift. I would think the likelihood of creating some sudden large-scale developmental shift to activate Integral consciousness in more than a handful of people at any time is infinitesimal, so long as nothing else in the historic context of human consciousness is pushing or catalyzing that change.
There's quite a number of potentially catalyzing forces emerging at this moment in time, though: Climate change, the collapse of global capitalism in the wake of peak oil, hyperconnectivity, etc. so the possibility of sudden radical transformational shifts can't be ruled out completely, I suppose. However, it would seem much more pragmatic to contemplate how our societies might navigate these tricky waters of change with individuals spread across the "bell curve of consciousness." Should we focus on individual growth and development, a world of "I"s rising one by one? or on mass cultural change driven by systems-theory type interventions in the cognitive field-flow of mental existence, now being accelerated and hyper-networked by the spread of ubiquitous webtech?
I propose the Integral shaman would say both, neither, and something else.
In "An Integral Age at the Leading Edge", we summarized the evidence suggesting that a cultural elite, representing less that 2% of the adult population, was entering psychosocial waves of development that could best be described as integral, and that this 2% might very well be the harbinger of integral waves of consciousness to follow in the culture at large. It is a paradoxical situation, in a sense, in that this "elite" is the first to actually embrace a radical inclusiveness, an inclusive not shared by the other 98% of the population at this time (although they, too, might develop into this inclusive and integral orientation).
One of the nagging problems I've had with Wilber's Integral development model is the presumption that those of "lesser" development might one day claw their way up into the "elite" realms of Integral consciousness, if only they.... what? meditate more? buy more of Wilber's books? It's never terribly clear.
It seems to me there have been "radically inclusive" thinkers throughout history, as well as less inclusive masses (who aren't always terribly receptive to the thinkers' notions). There have been some changes in the "midpoint" of that mass, but that sort of change has always been very slow, with a long, thick trail (tail?), and tied to generational cycles much like paradigm shift. I would think the likelihood of creating some sudden large-scale developmental shift to activate Integral consciousness in more than a handful of people at any time is infinitesimal, so long as nothing else in the historic context of human consciousness is pushing or catalyzing that change.
There's quite a number of potentially catalyzing forces emerging at this moment in time, though: Climate change, the collapse of global capitalism in the wake of peak oil, hyperconnectivity, etc. so the possibility of sudden radical transformational shifts can't be ruled out completely, I suppose. However, it would seem much more pragmatic to contemplate how our societies might navigate these tricky waters of change with individuals spread across the "bell curve of consciousness." Should we focus on individual growth and development, a world of "I"s rising one by one? or on mass cultural change driven by systems-theory type interventions in the cognitive field-flow of mental existence, now being accelerated and hyper-networked by the spread of ubiquitous webtech?
I propose the Integral shaman would say both, neither, and something else.
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